PORT TOWNSEND — Regardless of $250,000 in manmade rock armoring, when Mother Nature whips up powerful wind-driven waves around Point Wilson Lighthouse, there’s little that can stop her.
Such was the case Friday afternoon when high tides and westerly wind gusts fanned choppy surf that breached part of a rock wall.
The wall was stacked in July 2005 along the shoreline around the 92-year-old lighthouse.
Friday’s breach left the already-saturated grounds flooded around the lighthouse and lightkeeper’s house.
The extent of water damage to the lighthouse and other structures at Point Wilson was unknown on Friday.
Dave Frazeur, the Coast Guard Auxiliary’s “chief wickey,” who keeps the light burning, said the foghorn near the lighthouse washed away sometime Thursday.
“Especially when it’s high tide and westerly winds — that’s when it really catches hell,” Frazeur said.
Frazeur, who has watched the lighthouse facilities for 10 years and is now 84, said he has photos dating back to the 1930s that show how the shoreline around the lighthouse has evaporated.
Frazeur said he and others with the auxiliary plan to look inside the lighthouse facilities on Monday to check for damage and report it to Coast Guard officials.
Attempts to contact Shannon Ferrell, a Coast Guard official in Port Angeles responsible for North Olympic Peninsula lighthouse facilities maintenance, were unsuccessful Friday.
Relocation considered
State parks officials have long wanted to acquire the lighthouse from the Coast Guard, which would allow for consideration of relocating the buildings.
“It happens every time we have one of these storms,” Kate Burke, Fort Worden State Park manager, said of Point Wilson Lighthouse flooding and damage.
Over the past five years, the lighthouse has been flooded at least three times.
That’s why Burke recommends moving the lighthouse and lightkeeper’s house farther away from the shoreline as the only long-term solution to saving the structures.
“If we have any more big storms like we had yesterday, it’s not going to hold much longer,” Burke said Friday.
